Lives@Penn State

My first interviewee is Alyson, my English tutor. She is now a graduate student, majoring in Teaching English as a Second Language, and she comes from Florida, an amazing place.

Compared to State College, her hometown, as she mentioned, is warmer and there are more older people; besides her hometown is near the ocean while State College is mountainous. Nevertheless, as to size, population and foods, they are similar.

She likes studying here because she likes the program.

Alyson usually goes to Irvings and Websters for lunch. She likes the sandwiches there and her regular drink is ice tea.

She enjoys watching vollyball games at weekends and she suggests me watch it next time. In addition, she also likes watching movies ranging from action, romance to comedy. She told me that the theater near the mall provides $1 movies.

The place she wants to visit is Philadelphia, a famous city I also look forward to seeing.

******************************************************************************

The other person I interviewed is Wataru, my classmate. It was very nice of him to have taken the interview, and we finished it in a fairly efficient way, talking while walking.

Wataru majors in Economics and comes from a small city not far from Tokyo, where he finished 7 years study. He also thinks the climate here is chilly and he always has much pain getting up early.

He enjoys studying here and believes State College is good place for students to concentrate on study.

The two restaurants he visits most frequently are Big Bowl, a Chinese noodle restaurant, and Chillis, a Mexican one.

Wataru is very diligent that he spent much time on study even at weekends. He likes drinking and I can tell that he really enjoys it. Actually when I was working in Beijing, I also liked drinking a traditional wine as well as beer.

The Niagara Fall is the place he wants to visit and he also recommends me to go skating on campus, which I will try sometime.

Interview about striking up conversations with strangers

My interviewee's name is Chris, a senior student majoring in Biology. He is a vice president of a club, so he is used to talking with strangers, say, the new club members. No doubt he begins his talking with introduction of his club. He usually shakes hands after introduction. What’s interesting is that he doesn’t think “How do you do?” is too formal to be used in everyday life. The greetings he uses most are “Hi”, “How are you?”, “What’s up?” He usually stands up when somebody is introduced to him. However he mentioned that it is not really big deal if you don’t. He would like to strike up a conversation in bus stops when he sees somebody read a book or wear a T-shirt that interests him.

Sometimes if I find something interesting in common with some stranger, I will talk with him. Also if I need help, I will turn to strangers. Last time in the Willard building when I could not find the media center, I asked a girl “Hi! Excuse me? Could you tell me where is the room 26?” It's a really short conversation. But I believe I could make progress via more and more such practice.